Wednesday, April 2, 2014

Modern Arnis: Datu Dieter Knüttel

Datu Dieter is a founder of Deutscher Arnis Verband, (DAV), the German Modern Arnis association. He teaches all through Europe, has come here to the US, and trains regularly in the Philippines.

Datu Dieter actually started learning arnis through the lineage of Ernesto Presas, but moved into Remy Presas' Modern Arnis. My teacher Mark regularly cites Datu Dieter in class, especially when talking about combative applications of some of the higher-level skill sets, and when we talk about curriculum and training methodology.

I think Datu Dieter does a very good job in bringing a sense of showmanship to our art. For example, here's a demo they did some years back:

Flashy? Yes. Is this how we train most of the time? Nope. But I bet somebody in that audience that day said, "Wow, I gotta check this art out."

So let's see something a little more practical. This is a trailer for one of his training videos:

One more video, this one is a general advertisement for the DAV.

If you get a chance, check out Datu Dieter Knüttel's work. If you're in Europe, definitely check out the DAV. It's one of my goals in life to train there at least once. I hope they go easy on me!